


drabbles for donna

by danahscott



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Drabble Collection, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-01
Updated: 2017-07-01
Packaged: 2018-11-22 03:31:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 2,477
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11371686
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/danahscott/pseuds/danahscott
Summary: what it says on the tin. drabbles for donna.





	1. take me with you

Donna realized she made a mistake on an entirely ordinary day. She woke up five minutes late, grabbed coffee - she made her own, now - got to work ten minutes after she was due - but who would notice? Who ever notices? - and slid into her desk. Ten hours of phone call after phone call, typing up memo after memo, while letting her mind wander like it usually did to the night she saw the stars. 

And then, while looking out the window, waiting for the next coffee run, she saw a flash of a brilliant blue color, but when she blinked it was gone. “Tell Jim I’ll be out - I don’t know how long,” she called to Sandra, one of the saleswomen, not even bothering to look behind her and check if she was heard. 

She considered calling his name, but that’d just make her look stupid. Besides, who was to say he even remembered her? Donna speed-walked around the corner, looking everywhere for the TARDIS or a sight of his blue suit. Nothing. After about ten minutes of searching, she gave up, sitting on a bench and sighing. Donna ached and ached to be back there - seeing new planets and civilizations like he’d promised her that Christmas. 

It wasn’t the first time this had crossed her mind, but it was the first time she’d fully allowed herself to regret it. She should’ve said yes when he asked her. But she’d been scared and she’d just lost her fiance - evil though he was - and she was overwhelmed by the aliens and the spaceships and the death. But still, for that day, she really felt like something. Like someone. Someone who mattered. 

And then, like magic, an idea sprung into her head. She could still find him. Find the aliens, find the Doctor. She’d have to snoop around, but it wouldn’t be too hard, Donna was sure of it. Never mind the fact that he could be anywhere in time and space. Her mind was set.

Two hours later, Donna walked into her boss’ office and promptly resigned.


	2. pride

“Donna Noble, you saved the day!” The Doctor exclaimed, and Donna started to bite back a triumphant smile, but she decided to let it show. 

“Some help you were, too.” 

“Well,” he said, scratching behind his ear, “it was a little hard to do while I was kidnapped.” He paused then, and Donna could feel the Doctor smiling at her. “I’m proud of you, Donna. You saved a whole world just now.” 

Donna didn’t know what to say. She could barely remember a time in her life when someone had told her they were proud of her - besides Gramps. But here he was, saying it, meaning it. And - though hesitantly - Donna was proud of herself too.


	3. forgive and forget

Donna trembled, holding the Doctor closer to her. She’d done it, all by herself, saved her own skin, then saved the planet below her, then saved the Doctor. All of that, by herself. 

Gwog shook behind her on the floor of the spaceship, feebly reaching out a hand to Donna. “I’m sorry, I - I just,” he started to whimper, “I just wanted my people back.” So   
pathetic he looked, sapped of all his energy.

Donna turned to face him, glancing at the Doctor staring stoically ahead. “You can’t bring them back. You have to move on,” she said, not unkindly. “You can’t destroy and destroy just fix what’s broken.”

Gwog tried to push himself up, but his arms collapsed under him. “I just - I just -”

“I forgive you,” Donna said, looking him straight in the eye, then turning away, taking the Doctor by the hand. A year ago, she would have spat in Gwog’s face. But being with the Doctor had changed her. That could have been him had he not been as strong. 

Donna knew she’d be unable to forget the look on Gwog’s face when he lost everything but the thought that she’d tried to help him would have to be consolation enough.


	4. dangerous promise

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> donna post mind wipe

Wilf had never meant to let it get so far. A passing fancy, a glimpse through the window, the sight of something blue. Deep blue, reflected in the glass of the toy shop he’d take Donna to when she was little. When he turned around, it was gone. He’d been imagining the Doctor a lot lately, looking for him any time he thought maybe he’d show up. The Doctor had said one more time. That time hadn’t come yet. 

Any day now, Wilf would think to himself. But this time, he was sure he’d seen the TARDIS. It wasn’t like he could erase the image from his mind. He had a portfolio in his desk, filled with picture after picture that he’d scoured the internet for. He kept it hidden from Donna, of course. Mustn’t let her see. But then, the blueness he’d seen, he couldn’t have imagined that. Wilf was never very superstitious, but he took it as a sign. 

And then, there he’d ended up, sitting at the table, nervously fidgeting with his manilla folder. He slid out the first picture, the picture of the Doctor. 

“What’s all this for, Gramps?” Donna asked, already bored, and Wilf felt disappointment seep a little deeper into his heart. 

“Just a little bit of nonsense I found on the web.” 

“You’ve been on the web?”

“Just a little bit.” 

“Hang on,” Donna said, grabbing the picture and examining it closer. Wilf held his breath, nervously. “Isn’t that the man who was at the house a couple months back? John, was it?” Wilf nodded, studying her face. She stared at the picture a bit longer, uneasily and then decidedly set the picture face down on the table, like it unsettled her. 

He pulled the next picture out of his folder, tentatively, starting to feel an uneasy sensation form in the pit of his stomach. This one was of the TARDIS, standing on a street corner. Donna’s eyes widen a bit. 

“Well, this is just one of those old phone boxes, yeah?” She said, evenly, but he heard a trembling in her voice, and Wilf wondered if she was about to remember, about to break through. She clutched at her forehead. “Oh, my head hurts.” Wilf put the photos away, hurriedly, and like a rush, he remembered the promise he made. He remembered why he had made it. 

“Does it?”

“I was fine before. I don’t understand.” Wilf sucked in a breath, forcing a smile. 

“Why don’t you go lie down, sweetheart? Things will be better after a nap.” She nodded, squeezing her eyes shut and heading in the direction of her room. Wilf rubbed the back of his hand over his eyes, blinking back tears. “Things will be better with time,” he said, but he didn’t think she could hear him at all.


	5. biggest regret

Donna sighed, leaning back on her hands. She shivered. It was colder than she thought it would be. Normally, she’d go inside to get a coat but the distance between her backyard and the kitchen seemed insurmountable. Even from outside, she could hear Gramps and her mum fighting. It was a clear night. The stars were twinkling and Donna took a strange sort of solace in them. 

She remembered being surrounded by them, glowing around her, the light reflecting on his face. The Doctor’s face. She’d been thinking about him more and more often. Her heart ached at the words she had said to him when he’d invited her. She had been scared. She hadn’t been ready. She’d been mourning her fiance. Donna spent that whole night crying and crying and she hadn’t told her mum or Gramps what had happened. She kept it holed up inside her. 

But she had been the first human to ever see the creation of the Earth. She had been the only one. At least, that was what he had told her. Donna didn’t bloody know anymore. She had long outgrown the notion that the universe cared about her. She asked if she’d see him again, and he had told her if he was lucky. It seemed to ring so untrue now. She would need a miracle to cross his path again. 

Donna peered through Gramps’ telescope. There it was, Sirius, the brightest star in the sky. If she ever met the Doctor again, she thought she might ask him to take her there.


	6. memory

She dreamed about it sometimes. And it was in her dreams that she mourned all she had lost. In her dreams, she remembered, and in her dreams, she realized she had forgotten. So, it was true, also, that in Donna’s dreams, she simply relived her old adventures, the ones she had loved, that ones that she imagined would go on forever, the ones that were lost to her now.

And the Doctor, she dreamed about him vividly, in stark colors, and loud voices. She wondered how he was doing, but knew that he must be hurting. Rose was gone, she was gone, and he must be all alone. But Donna tried not to think about it too hard, for fear of wasting the short amount of time she had on something sad. So instead, she remembered libraries and Agatha Christie and saving the Ood. 

And every morning, when she woke up, she had the oddest feeling, like something was missing, but she had no idea what. But Donna just shrugged it off, went about with her day, and the locked up part of her waited for the night.


	7. why are you looking at me like that

Donna squirmed under his gaze, under his smile, under his sheen of pride. She hadn’t done anything, hadn’t fixed anything, hadn’t saved the day. And yet - he was looking at her as if she’d done something important. 

She hadn’t. She never had. “What?” She asked him, demanded him. The Doctor raised an eyebrow, amused. 

“You saved the day today, Donna.” For a second, she almost told him he was wrong. That she hadn’t helped, not really, that it was luck, that anyone could have done it. But she was learning that he actually cared, that he wanted her to know he was proud of her. She was learning not to hold her tongue and keep her head down like Shawn had wanted her to. She was learning that she was worth it, or at least that he thought so. So instead of telling him she hadn’t done anything at all, she nodded, and smiled.

“Yes,” she said, rolling the word around on her tongue, seeing how it felt, “yes I did.”


	8. insomnia

“Donna,” she heard from the console room. “You’re still awake?” She looked back. The Doctor had been off, tinkering with the library or something. Donna sat with her feet dangling out the TARDIS door. Months ago, that would have terrified her half to death, but now it was almost second nature. She shrugged, smiling at him and sliding to her left so he had room to sit. 

He squeezed in between her and the door and they sat in silence for a moment, watching the stars burn from afar. “Hard to sleep sometimes.”

“Yeah? Why’s that?:

“I don’t want to miss a single thing. All these planets and things, whizzing about the universe, while I’m snoring in bed? Don’t think so.” She sighed, leaning back on her hands. “Well, it’s not like you have to worry. You never sleep.”

“Gift of the Time Lord.” He paused for a second, and they slipped into another comfortable silence. It was hard to make small talk when the stars were splayed out under your feet. “You should sleep, Donna. There’ll be an adventure in the morning.”

Donna shifted, reluctant to get up. “Isn’t there always?” She yawned. “I suppose you’re right, anyway. I’ve got all the time in the world to see this. Guess I just can’t get enough.”


	9. sweater

Over the year she travelled with the Doctor, Donna had pocketed a large supply of the TARDIS’ wardrobe. Every time they’d stop on an alien planet, Donna insisted they find a gift shop. What was the point of travelling through time and space if you never got to remember it? The Doctor always found it a bit odd, an issue he had no problem voicing. But Donna knew he didn’t mind. She knew that he always liked to see other people get excited about something new. 

She stashed the clothes in her room aboard the ship. She relished travelling to the past anand finding another period dress to wear. Was it vain? Maybe. Was it frivolous? Probably, but Donna didn’t want to stop, and saw no reason why she should. It was nice to enjoy herself.

Until it wasn’t. Until she forgot the best years of her life and was left a hollow form of her former self, without someone to believe in her. And then, she wore baggy sweatshirts and jeans too tight - Donna didn’t know why, she did run so much anymore. And then, stuffed in the back of her closet was a sweater - “the softest sweater in the universe.” She felt unsettled. It certainly was soft to the touch, and yet, it contained a feeling - nostalgia? Longing, maybe? Yearning for something. Except that was silly. Clothes don’t hold feelings. So she slipped it on and ignored the rumbling of her heart the whole rest of the day. She didn’t remember how she ran in that sweater, hand in hand with her best friend, how she laughed in that sweater, hugged a being like she wouldn’t have been able to imagine. She didn’t remember how she fell asleep in that sweater, letting the day’s memories stitch itself into the fabric. 

It was just a sweater. It was just a sweater. It was just a sweater.


	10. that idiot

That idiot. That stupid, stupid fool. He had to go and get himself kidnapped, leave Donna stranded god knows where. Her third alien planet, and he vanishes out of thin air. Donna had figured he’d be the one doing the rescuing - he was the alien, wasn’t he? - but no, like a damsel in distress, he’d left her alone. 

Donna could feel her face turning red. It was hot on the planet, three suns burning, but the Doctor had assured her they were far enough away. Regardless, beams of sweat formed at Donna’s hairline, and she impatiently wiped them away, taking in her surrounding. Okay. It’s crowded. And the people are blue. She spun around, but it was like walking through a sea of smurfs. There was no way she’d be able to - and then, she saw it, a long lock of yellow hair poking through blue spray paint. The sweat had worn part of the woman’s painted skin, revealing a pale human complexion underneath. 

Donna sighed, and then, with only slight hesitation, ran in her direction, to presumably the heart of trouble, where the Doctor always was.

**Author's Note:**

> hmu on tumblr @kirayukimuras


End file.
